That's well above the 130,000 increase that economists had been expecting the report would show, Reuters reports.

Produced by Automatic Data Processing Inc. and Macroeconomic Advisers, the ADP report is something of a preview each month of the even more anxiously anticipated employment report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics — which comes out Friday at 8:30 a.m. ET. So it could be a sign that BLS will also say there was solid, if unspectacular, job growth vs. October.

Also this morning, the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas released its monthly report on layoff plans at the nation's employers. It shows a recent dip in layoff announcements, but underscores how tough the labor market has been for most of the year. The firm says that:

"The number of planned layoffs announced in November remained virtually unchanged from the previous month, as U.S.-based employers reported job cuts totaling 42,474, down 0.7 percent from 42,759 in October. ...

"November job cuts were down 13 percent from the same month a year ago when employers announced plans to cut 48,711 jobs from their payrolls. November marks the second consecutive month of lower job cuts after surging to a 28-month high of 115,730 in September.

"With one month remaining in 2011, job cuts for the year total 564,297, officially surpassing the 2010 year-end total of 529,973. The 11-month total is 13 percent higher than the 497,969 job cuts announced over the same period a year ago."